DE: Just another pretty face

[bjornwilde]

 From this weekend's trolling for topic ideas, 1nv1nc1ble  wanted to ask:

Suggestions for character icons. I've got someone that I'm planning on apping in October, but I'm having difficulty finding a good image. I'm sure other people have similar problems. Maybe we put it to the group and crowdsource.

So, I guess this could be either sharing icon sources or tagging in with characters you want to find faces for and we'll give suggestions?

Comments

[athelstanthescribe]

I've never been completely satisfied with George Clooney as Michael Carpenter - or Jonathan Rhys Meyers as Roshaun, for that matter. Better suggestions happily accepted.

[bjornwilde]

For some reason, Jean Reno came to mind for Michael, though I should mention I've not read past the first Dresden book.

And I've only read the first few books of Young Wizards and that was ages ago. Sorry.

[camwyn]

One of my favorite places to look for icons of human characters is http://thedailies.grimfandango.org. In the past I've also gone to web sites for various sports teams or the Olympic games or things like that, since athletes have a lot of pictures out there but aren't usually anywhere near as overused as actors/actresses.

For older human characters or NPCs I will occasionally go through university web sites and look for pictures of faculty members. I've also pulled one or two pictures from companies' "About the Management Team" web pages when I've needed to get an icon for an NPC. I don't do these nearly as often as the sources in the first paragraph, though. Partly because these are likely to be the only photos of these people, and partly because celebrities and athletes are more in the public eye to begin with.

ETA: Almost forgot- while I haven't used any as PBs yet, in the past when I've needed models for practicing drawing from photo reference, I've grabbed cooking magazines or looked up celebrity chefs. They tend to have a wider range of expressions than generic actor/actress/model photographs. (Plus, if you need to practice drawing hands, you can't do better than a knife skills tutorial.)

[bjornwilde]

These are all great ideas!

[bjornwilde]

My current PB dilemma is Tybalt from Seanan McGuire's October Daye series. I'm trying Jackson Rathbone but he doesn't quite have the gravitas the King of Cats requires. I've used Jared Leto before but was limited in facial expressions. Jonathan Rhys Meyers is tempting, but I'm not a fan of how vacuous he can look at times. Colin O'Donoghue is tempting as well but he's too well known as Hook (Once Upon A Time).

Totally open for suggestions. Basically I need brown hair, light colored eyes, and a range from happy to serious to vicious yet at the same time seeming cat-like. I'm also hoping for more city like than feral.

ETA: OK, looking more into Jonathan Rhys and I am finding a lot of good images. May have found my face, especially with Gormenghast, The Mortal Instruments, The Tudors, and Dracula to work with.

[cameoflage]

If you already have a PB in mind -- although most of their coverage is actors and models -- you can try find_icons and wikicon over on IJ. I mostly use my IJ to obtain icons (and occasionally post them when I can't find icons of someone but I can find lots of raw photos), so its friendslist is almost entirely composed of flocked icon journals and communities. Most of those communities are ones I discovered through those icon hubs. (Some of them I had to wait a while to be added to.)

Hollow Art has a large database with tags for lots of different physical attributes, but I find their actual icons too low-quality, so I like to do PB hunts there and then stock up on icons elsewhere once I have a name. pb_updates doesn't host icons themself, but they're a comprehensive directory that also has lots of tag coverage. find_a_pb is a dedicated community for matching descriptions to people.

[last_kallig]

I would love help finding icons for Rocket the Raccoon from the Guardians of the Galaxy movie!

I've never looked for icons of a non-human character before, so it's all new to me.

[bjornwilde]

Do you have the means to edit larger images to icon size?

Cause Grande caps does have screencaps of a few of the trailers, at least the first two trailers. (01, 02). I'd advise just downloading the zip since their galleries have been spotty. Searching the Rocket Raccoon and Guardians tag on Tumblr can be an option also.

Google image searches with the size tool can help if you have no way of editing, i.e. cropping, larger images.

[last_kallig]

I've always just used the auto sizing thing Dreamwidth gives you when you import an image for an icon. What size does Dreamwidth default to on icons?

Thank you for the link!

[bjornwilde]

100 x 100. Those screencaps are going to be huge, like at least 900 x 500 or so and likely TV or Movie screen sized.

[last_kallig]

Ah, a lot bigger, then. Thank you.

[lazy_but_loyal]

Do you need help cropping and resizing images for icons? If you send me/link the images you want for icons, I can do that. I make all my own, they're pretty simple but straightforward for RP use.

[last_kallig]

Thank you! I may take you up on that, once I find images. I suspect there will be a lot more to choose from once the DVD is out in a few months.

[lazy_but_loyal]

No problem!

There are some good closeups from the trailer in this gallery here. And I'm surprised that there aren't more images out already...

http://avengersuniverse.com/2014/06/20/30-screencaps-from-guardians-of-the-galaxy-international-trailer/

[1nv1nc1ble]

As soon as life stops kicking me in the head, I'll be apping a new character, Michael Gallitin from The Wolf's Hour by Robert McCammon. Michael is described as being tall, physically fit, with dark hair and eyes of a striking shade of green, and scarred. I have a book cover picture, but was hoping someone might have some suggestions for something/someone with more expression.

[bjornwilde]

The cover makes me think of Daniel Day Lewis for some reason. He seems to have darker eyes and no scares but he's craggy enough, scares seem to be suggested? Not having much luck for icons, but here's a LJ comm which has icon posts or Fanpop.

Hollow Art can also be a good resorce and if you go to the search tab, you can look by age, eye color, gender, and more.

[1nv1nc1ble]

So, I just checked out Hollow Art, and one of the searches for twenty-somethings with green eyes came up with Tyler Hoechlin from "Teen Wolf." Considering that Michael is a werewolf, I might have to just go with him. :)

[shadowandsnark]

Cool! Fair warning though, I think we have that character in Milliways, or at least approved if Friday's DE is any indication.